The Miracle Part 13

At the door of the room, she fished inside her purse, found her key, and put it in the lock.

Aware of his continued presence, she said, "Thank you."

She unlocked the door, pushed it open, and went inside. He followed her, shutting the door behind him.

"I thought I'd see you safely inside," he said.

"You have," she said. "I appreciate it."

"Are you all right?" he asked.

"I'm fine. I'd better get to sleep. Thank you again." She put out her hand, and taking it, feeling the warm flesh of her hand, he was further aroused.

He held her hand tightly. "Any time," he said quietly. Abruptly, he pulled her to him, and pressed his rough lips against hers, kissing her hard. She struggled, tearing herself free.

She was breathing fast. "What are you doing?" she gasped.

"Natale, I just wanted to kiss you. I-I'd like to stay here tonight."

"You can't. I don't want anything like that. Now please go."

"Come on, be a sport, Natale. You owe me. Don't you want to do something for me? Sure you do."

"Not that," she said, her voice rising. "I don't owe you that." She tried to contain herself. "You were nice to me, and I appreciate it, but now you're not being so nice, and I don't like it. I'd suggest you not cause any trouble. Just be a gentleman and leave right now."

"All right, you win," he said with mock contriteness. "But you are something special, so don't blame me for trying. Sorry it didn't work out. Good-night."

"Good-night," she said with finality.

Anatole walked to the door, opened it noisily, and then banged it shut firmly, but remained in the bedroom. Soundlessly, he eased himself against the wall beside the closed door.

She stood at the foot of her bed a few moments, sagging with relief. Then with a sigh, she felt her way along the bed to the closet, reached inside for her white nightgown and threw it on the bed.

Anatole held his breath, wondering whether or not she was aware that he was still in the room.

Then he was sure that she was not aware of him, was certain that he had left and that she was quite alone.

Through narrowed eyes, he watched her. She had unb.u.t.toned her dress and was pulling it off. She was wearing only a flimsy bra.s.siere and tight string bikini briefs now. She turned away from him to hang her dress in the closet, and then stepped back to the bed, unhooking her bra. The bra was off now and those fantastic firm b.r.e.a.s.t.s, with the great brown b.u.t.tons of nipples, bobbed free, were facing him. She was reaching down to take off her panties. He caught his breath, his heart hammering with excitement, and the bulge at his crotch about to burst.

Her bikini panties were coming down now, she was lifting one bare leg and then the other to step out of them, and the triangle of curly pubic hair was visible, and Anatole was out of control, unable to restrain himself a second longer.

He zipped open the fly of his trousers, let his full erection burst out, and charged across the bedroom toward her.

Mikel Hurtado, having left the elevator at the second floor, proceeded down the corridor toward room 206. He had just pa.s.sed the door of 205, and was nearing his own door, when he heard a m.u.f.fled scream, a scream from somewhere nearby.

Startled, Hurtado halted in his tracks, listening intently.

Another mufiled drawn-out scream, high-pitched, a woman's, and definitely from inside the room next door to his.

Next door. The blind girl, the blind girl at the grotto. The beginning of another scream, abruptly choked off. Something was going on in there, something terribly wrong, and Hurtado did not bother to think, did not hesitate.

Whirling around, he rushed back to the door of 205. He could clearly hear scuffling. He had grabbed at the doork.n.o.b, meaning to grip it and heave himself against the door to break it down, when the door, unlocked, flew open.

Hurtado was inside the room.

Instantly, he saw what was happening-the young girl naked on the bed, beating with her fists, as some animal, the palm of one hand clamped over her mouth, trousers half down, was trying to get on top of her and between her legs.

Rape, savage attempted rape, was what Hurtado saw. Neither of them on the bed, in their struggle, was aware that someone else was in the room.

Enraged by what he was seeing, in a mindless fury at what the monster was trying to do to this helpless girl, Hurtado hurtled himself across the room to the bed. His hands clutched at the a.s.sailant's shoulders, yanking him off the girl, and throwing him on the floor. Anatole, stunned by surprise, scrambled to his feet, hampered by the trousers around his ankles, too amazed to lift his hands. Hurtado was on Anatole in a single motion, driving his right fist to the a.s.sailant's jaw and smas.h.i.+ng his left fist into the rapist's abdomen. As Anatole groaned, doubling up, Hurtado unleashed more punches, battering the other's head and face. Anatole began to crumple, and Hurtado kept landing his pile-driver punches.

Anatole lay sprawled on the rug, half senseless, blood trickling from his mouth.

Hurtado reached down, hooked his hands under the man's arms and dragged him across the room and through the doorway into the hall. There, he dropped the dazed rapist. Briefly, Hurtado considered whether he should summon the police, but quickly decided against it. He wanted no contact with any police while he was in Lourdes.

Instead, he kicked the rapist in the ribs, and in a low voice, so as not to awaken any guests, he warned him. "You get out of here, you f.u.c.king b.a.s.t.a.r.d, you get out of here and get out fast, or I'll grind you into a meatball."

With effort, fright showing in his puffed eyes, Anatole climbed to his feet clutching his trousers, dribbling blood and nodding. He turned, almost tripping, and staggered toward the staircase. s.n.a.t.c.hing at the rail, he plunged down the stairs and out of sight.

Hurtado grunted, and slowly went back into the girl's bedroom. She was standing in a bathrobe, tying the sash, and groping for her dark gla.s.ses on the bed and putting them on.

"Don't worry, senorita, he's gone," Hurtado said in Spanish. She asked him something in Italian. He said in English, "I don't understand Italian. You speak English?"

"Yes, English . . . Did you call the police?" she asked, still trembling.

"Not necessary," Hurtado said. "He won't be back. I think he's the fellow who works as a night receptionist downstairs. But I'm sure he won't be back on the job or even stay in town. Are you okay?"

"Just scared," she said.

"Don't blame you," Hurtado said. "That's an awful thing to have happen. How did it happen?"

She explained what had taken place, how she had gone down to the grotto by herself to pray, how the spiritual intensity had made her faint, how this person had come out of nowhere to revive her and bring her back to her room, how he'd tricked her into believing that he had left the room when he had actually remained inside determined to rape her.

"Thank G.o.d for you," she concluded. "How you got in here in time I don't know, but I owe you a lot."

"It was sheer luck," Hurtado said matter-of-factly. "I was out for a late night walk, was coming back to my room to go to sleep-I have the bedroom next to yours-when I heard you scream. I was going to break in to see what was happening, but the door had been left unlocked." He paused. "Are you better now?"

"Much better," she said with a wonderful smile. She came hesitantly around the bed toward him, stumbling once, righting herself, apologizing. "I-I'm blind, you know."

"I know," he said.

She put out her hand. "I'm Natale Rinaldi, from Rome."

He took her hand, shook it, released it. "I'm Mikel Hurtado," he said, "from-from Spain."

"Pleased to know you," she said, "to put it mildly. Are you here for the Virgin?"

He hesitated. "For a cure, an arthritic condition."

"Maybe both of us will be fortunate."

"I hope so," he said.

"Well, I don't know what more to say except thank you again. Thank you a million times."

"If you really want to thank me," he said sternly, "you can do so by promising never to let strangers see you to your room -- and by keeping the door locked from the inside from now on."

She held up one hand. "I promise," she said.

"Now you get some sleep, Natale, and I will, too."

"Good-night, Mikel"

"Good-night," he said, and he went through the doorway, closing the door.

He listened for the lock to turn. The lock turned. He put his mouth close to the door, and said, "Good girl."

He heard her say, "I hope we run into each other again."

"We will," he a.s.sured her. "Good-night."

At his door, unlocking it, he knew that he wanted to see her again. She was a dehcious girl, so lovely, so sweet. He had never met a young woman quite like her, and he did want to see her again. Maybe he would. But he reminded himself he was here for business not romance.

He must be all business from now on. No diversions. No failure.

Euskadi was his life. The freedom of Euskadi came before anything. There was work to do. Sorry, Natale, he thought. There is only one love, the homeland I've never had, and will have yet.

Behind the steering wheel of her venerable Renault, Gisele Dupree, her blond hair tied in a neat ponytail, her features scrubbed and s.h.i.+ny and without makeup, drove unhurriedly through Tarbes and on the highway toward Lourdes. Sergei Tikhanov sat uneasily in the pa.s.senger seat beside her. His uneasiness came from Gisele's disturbing habit of turning toward him when she spoke instead of keeping her eyes on the road.

But then he realized that the deeper uneasiness he felt came from an unnerving happening that had occurred last night. With a shudder, he relived it- Last night, asleep in the Dupree apartment, Tikhanov had awakened from a terrible nightmare in a cold sweat at four in the morning. Once fully awake, the nightmare had swum vividly before his eyes. He was running frantically from members of the KGB, desperately trying to find a place to hide.

Sitting up in bed, turning on the lamp, he found that the horror of the nightmare had blurred slightly, and in the light he sought reason. What had brought on the scare? General Kossoff and the KGB weren't chasing him. They were, in reality, honoring him. He was their star, soon to be the most s.h.i.+ning star in the Soviet Union. But he had tried to hide from them in the nightmare-and immediately he'd understood that aspect of the nightmare and tried to interpret it.

The hiding part had to do with the present risk he had undertaken, and his total failure to sublimate his fear of being found out.

By coming to Lourdes, he had put himself in a precarious situation, watching each step he made in his frontal move on faith and the hope for a cure. Yet, intent on this daring effort, he had neglected to protect his flank sufiiciently. He had neglected to keep in touch with those in the Soviet Union who might need him most any minute and not be able to find him. What if they searched for him, and somehow managed to find him here?

A tremor went through Tikhanov.

And then he realized he could prevent any suspicions by simply being in touch with his colleagues by phone before making himself visible to them once more in person.

At the first opportunity he would contact the Soviet Emba.s.sy in Paris. He would call there, supposedly from Lisbon-no, he had called from Lisbon already -- better to have returned to France to meet secretly with an arm of the Conmiunist apparatus near Ma.r.s.eilles.

Having decided this, he felt a weight lifted off him. For now, he had better concentrate on what was before him, meaning his absolute anonymity in Lourdes.

Worriedly, he glanced at his talkative driver behind the wheel.

Tikhanov was in no mood to engage in conversation with anyone, let alone this country girl. He wanted only to restore his health, and get to the seat of power that awaited him in the Kremlin as soon as possible. From a comer of his eye he saw a road sign. Twenty kilometers to Lourdes. Last night, in the taxi, the journey had taken a good half hour. At the rate the Dupree girl was going, it might take almost a full hour -- and give her too much time for conversation.

As if reading his mind, she turned her head and said, "No hurry. It's just after eight and I don't have my first tour until nine this morning. It is such a glorious day, not hot like yesterday." She inhaled the fresh air through the open window. "On days like this I could stay here forever." Then she added enigmatically, "But I won't." She looked at him. "Have you ever been to Lourdes before, Mr. Talley?"

At first he was unaware that he had been addressed, his mind drifting, and he did not respond. He had forgotten that he was Mr. Talley, but with a start he remembered his acquired name. Hastily he became more alert as he rephed. "No," he said, "no, I have never been anywhere near here."

"When did you get here?" she inquired. "Oh, yes, it was yesterday when you were trying to find a room."

"Yes, yesterday late."

"From Paris?"

"I stopped over in Paris, yes, I have friends in Paris."

"And you came here for a cure you told me last night. Is yours a recent illness?"

He was uncertain of how to answer her. He said, "Something I've had off and on for several years."

"What made you finally decide to come here? The news about the Virgin Mary reappearing?"

"I suppose that inspired me. It made me curious. I thought I would give it a try."

"Nothing to lose," she said with a lilt. "Possibly everything to gain."

"I am hoping."

"You will remain the entire week?"

"If necessary. I hope to go back home no later than next Monday. My vacation will be nearly over."

"Home," she said, eyes now on the road. "Where do you make your home in the States, Mr. Talley?"

He thought quickly. He had not antic.i.p.ated personal questions and had not thought about this before. He tried to recall some remote places he had visited in the American East, places a person like Samuel Talley might have come from. He recalled a weekend trip he had made to a small town and resort called Woodstock, Vermont. "I come from Vermont," he said. "My wife and I have a modest farm in Woodstock."

"I've heard of it," she said. "I've heard it is picturesque."

"It is, it is." Tikhanov was worrying. He wondered if she had detected an accent in his English. He had better cover the possibility. He went on casually, "Actually, my parents emigrated from Russia, separately, when my mother was fourteen and my father eighteen. They met in New York at a social event, and fell in love, and were married. My father had been a farmer, and he found this property in Vermont and bought it. I was born there." Very casually, the next. "Growing up, I learned to speak Russian. It was natural. There was always Russian, as well as English, spoken around the house."

"I love languages," Gisele said. "I speak four but Russian is not one of them."

"No loss," said Tikhanov.

"And you work the farm?" inquired Gisele.

This girl was too inquisitive and smart. It was no use lying. She might see that his soft hands were not those of a farmer. He forced a short laugh. "Me labor on the farm? No, no. The truth is I'm a professor." He was feeling his way now. "Uh, a professor of the Russian language. I went to Columbia University, in fact majored in Russian and linguistics. After I got my doctorate, I became a member of the language department at Columbia. I teach Russian there."

"How do you manage to do it? I mean, live in Woodstock and teach in New York?"

Traps, everywhere there were traps, but as a diplomat Tikhanov was used to avoiding them. "Quite simple," he said. "I keep a small apartment in Manhattan to use during the school year, but maintain our home in Woodstock, and commute there whenever I can. My wife stays mostly at the Vermont house these days. She's a Vermont native and we have a son at-at the University of Southern California. He is studying theater arts." In an effort to leave the fict.i.tious past behind, he made a transition into the present. "My wife was a Catholic, so I became a Catholic, too. I am not too religious, as I mentioned last night. Still, enough so to come to Lourdes."

"But you work in New York City?" she said.